


Fireworks

by Caedmon



Series: Doctor/Rose Prompts [32]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Love Confessions, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-07-17
Packaged: 2018-07-24 00:08:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7485624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caedmon/pseuds/Caedmon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Most powerful being in the universe, me,” he said, not looking at her. “And I’ve got a chink in my armor you could fly a TARDIS through. I’ve got a weakness. A soft underbelly. And there’s nothing I can do about it.”</i>
  <br/>
  <i>Rose narrowed her eyes, confused, and shook her head at him. “I don’t understand…”</i>
  <br/>
  <i>“You have me wrapped around your little finger, Rose Tyler, ready to do your bidding. What will you do with that kind of power?”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Ignition

**Author's Note:**

> This fic serves several purposes... it started a couple of weeks ago as a prompt from hellostarlight20, who wanted Nine in a tux and the tux coming off, with articles of clothing scattered all over. I also started it when the timepetalsprompts weekly prompt was 'fireworks', so it fits that, as well. Lastly, there's been a post circulating lately calling for more Nine/Rose smut, and I aim to please.
> 
> It's a different take on an old trope: _the Doctor and Rose are at a ball when the Doctor gets jealous; sexytimes ensue.._. I wanted to explore what that would look like if the jealousy didn't manifest as fiery hot rage and possessiveness. So this is a bit different from the other (brilliant) fics I've read in the same vein. It's also a bit longer than most at six chapters. I'm going to be updating as often as tenroseforeverandever allows me to.
> 
> A couple of notes:  
> ~ I own nothing. Everything is the BBC's.  
> ~ beta'd by tenroseforeverandever, but every single mistake is mine.  
> ~ your kudos and comments feed the muse and are so very, very appreciated.  
> ~ come talk to me! caedmonfaith.tumblr.com

The Doctor looked up at the exploding fireworks above his head, frowning. He didn’t want to be there, didn’t feel like celebrating, and certainly didn’t feel like wearing this stupid tuxedo. Nothing good ever happened to him in a tuxedo. But he _was_ wearing it, of course, and he _was_ here, at this celebration. Rose had wanted him to be, and all the gods knew just how little willpower he had when it came to resisting Rose Tyler. 

They’d landed on Ryn four days earlier, a human colony that had sent out a distress call. The Doctor, Rose, and Jack had come to investigate and found that the colonists were having trouble with the local native population. The ‘natives’ were in fact an earlier batch of colonists, a simple race that had come to Ryn from Earth a couple of centuries before, much like pilgrims. They had been seeking to isolate themselves from what they felt was persecution for their religion, and didn’t want the hassle of outside interference. They had become an agrarian society, using what little land was fertile and capable of producing crops, ignoring or eschewing most of the technology that had gotten them there after it had served its initial purpose. However, the new colonists wanted to use Ryn’s natural resources to make it a hub of industry, believing the planet to be perfectly placed to become a shining jewel of the Kath system. The original Ryn preferred to be left alone. A civil war had ensued. 

The TARDIS had landed in the middle of the battlefield, shocking the Ryn - old and new - into ceasing all aggression towards each other. The Doctor and his companions had exited their ship and immediately called for a parley to discuss a permanent cease-fire. The heads of the opposing armies had agreed, and the fighting had been called off while the members of Team TARDIS met with the military and political heads. 

It had taken nearly the entire four days to work out the details of a treaty. Jack had applied his considerable charm - appropriately for once - and Rose had been fantastic, just as she always was. The Ryn had been enchanted by her and had responded well to her natural empathy and compassion towards both sides. She’d ended up playing a key role in the negotiations while the Doctor watched, in awe of her, as he so frequently was. 

When all was said and done, the treaty signed and both sides reasonably happy with the agreement, the Ryn had wanted to celebrate coming to a peaceful settlement. The Doctor had wanted to scarper - he’d wanted nothing to do with the planned ball. His preferred method was to give a friendly wave and fly away after situations like this. Rose and Jack, however, had wanted to stay for the celebration. The Doctor had still been ready to flip the switch that would send them back into the Vortex, but Rose’s disappointed look had stayed his hand. 

His voice had been soft when he asked her, “Do you really want to stay, Rose?”

She’d given a noncommittal shrug. “Not if you don't want to.”

He’d sighed, knowing he was beaten, then taken her chin and turned her face up to his, waiting until she looked at him. 

“I want you to be happy, Rose. Would it make you happy to go to this ball?”

“Not if you’re not there.”

He’d softened even more. If she wanted him with her, he’d be with her. There was nothing he would deny her, not if it was within his power to grant it. 

“Go. Get dressed for a ball, Cinderella. I’ll get into my tux.”

“Really?” The sparkle in her eyes had been worth it, he thought. 

He’d smiled down at her. “Best get to it, before I change my mind,” he’d teased. 

She’d stood on tiptoe and kissed his cheek, ensuring that he _wouldn’t_ change his mind, then had run off to tell Jack and change her clothes. He’d just stood there in her wake, bemused and besotted as he so often was around her, watching her retreating form and absently fingering the place her lips had met his skin. 

Now it was hours later and here he was, standing against the wall of the open-air ballroom with fireworks lighting up the sky above him while he scowled at the proceedings. 

As he had anticipated, Rose had been the belle of the ball, and nearly every eligible Ryn man (and quite a few of the women) had been vying for her attention. Rose had been polite but showed no special consideration to any of them, much to the Doctor’s relief. 

He felt lovesick and pathetic, watching her spin around the dance floor all night, never with the same partner more than once. He didn’t want to watch, didn’t want to hurt himself that way, but he couldn’t help it. Couldn’t take his eyes off of her. The beading on her red dress caught the light and sparkled, drawing his eye with her every move. Her leg made frequent appearances from the slit up the side of her dress that, quite frankly, should be illegal. 

He wanted to claim her. He wanted to steal her away from all of the pretty boys who danced attendance on her. He wanted to twirl her around the dance floor himself, to impress her with his moves, his skill. 

He wanted her in his arms, wanted her whisky-brown eyes looking up at _him_ , intoxicating _him_. Not these tossers who didn’t know her, could never appreciate just how fantastic and precious she was. 

He wanted it all, and he wanted it with Rose Tyler. The Doctor felt like he was positively grasping with greed towards this girl, and the knowledge of her effect on him humiliated and terrified him. 

He couldn’t see her just then, she’d disappeared into the crowd. He scanned the crowd, seeking her out, and found her at the opposite end of the ballroom, being led from the floor by one of the higher-ranking members of the New Ryn military. The man was trying to chat her up, but even from this distance, the Doctor could detect Rose’s disinterest and her subtle signs that she was trying to get away from him. 

His hands curled into fists at his sides, but he did nothing just yet. Rose didn’t appreciate being mollycoddled, and she wouldn’t be thrilled with him tearing off the head of the bloke. 

The young sergeant didn’t seem to be taking the hint, however, and Rose resorted to what he could tell was a curt reply as she tried to step away from him. The Doctor watched, horrified and furious, as the bastard put his hands on the wall, bracketing Rose and blocking her escape. 

His nails dug into his palms and he shoved off the wall he was leaning against, starting across the ballroom, heedless of the people in his way. He was determined to get to Rose and get her away from the pillock who dared to cage her in.

The Doctor stopped in his tracks before he’d gone more than a few steps. Jack Harkness had appeared from nowhere to clap a hand on the sergeant’s shoulder and spin him around, pulling him away from Rose. Even with his excellent hearing, he couldn’t make out what Jack was saying, but he could tell from Jack’s demeanor that it was angry, threatening. The blighter tried to defend himself and Jack shoved him backwards with both hands, reaching blindly with one hand for Rose’s hand, taking it and pulling her away from the wall, out onto the dance floor. Rose smiled up at him, grateful, as he pulled her into his arms. 

Jack Harkness. Her protector. Her savior. Her hero. 

The Doctor stared at Jack and Rose as they twirled around the dance floor and felt his thoughts exploding within his mind much like the fireworks above him, but much less beautiful, much less joyous. Just noisy detonations of jealousy and envy that popped and crackled every time Rose smiled or laughed up at Jack.

Jack was being everything that _he_ wanted to be. _He_ wanted to be the one that Rose relied on, the one she trusted to keep her safe. Not some 51st century pretty boy. 

The Doctor cursed under his breath. Right. Clearly, he wasn’t needed. Jack was there to take care of her. Rose’s smile at her savior was like a knife wound to the gut, and he felt his shoulders slump.

Turning away from the revelers, he walked out of the ballroom into the night, the light of the fireworks above lighting his lonely path back to the TARDIS. 

He hadn’t wanted to come anyway. 

~*~O~*~

Jack was, for once, keeping his hands in respectable places, and Rose wondered if he was trying to set an example for the other men and women of Ryn who seemed much less...formal. 

He joked with her, something about the dance steps reminding him of a traditional waltz mixed with hip-hop, and Rose laughed a little. 

She looked up and saw the Doctor leaving the ballroom, his hands jammed in his pockets, his head hanging, looking utterly defeated. Alarm bells immediately sounded in her head and she stiffened in Jack’s arms. 

“Jack?”

“Yeah, Rosie?”

“Why is the Doctor leaving?”

Jack followed her eyes just in time to see the Time Lord exit the ballroom. 

“I dunno,” he shrugged. “Must have gotten bored.”

Rose shook her head. “That’s not it.”

“Maybe he just wanted some air?”

“It’s an open-air ballroom, Jack. There’s no ceiling and plenty of air. Something’s wrong, I’m telling you.”

Jack gave her a squeeze. “You know how he gets sometimes, Rosie. I’m sure he’s fine.”

“This seems different,” she insisted. “Something is _really_ bothering him.” She watched the empty doorway he’d just exited, then turned to Jack. “He’ll have gone back to the TARDIS. I’m going to check on him.”

“Rose…”

“I _have_ to, Jack. He wouldn’t let _me_ wander off alone and upset like that. I need to make sure he’s okay.”

Jack sighed. “Oh, alright. I’ll go with you.”

Rose shook her head and put her hands on Jack’s shoulders. “You stay. You haven’t seduced every person in the room yet.” She gave him a cheeky grin, then went on. “Besides, depending on what’s wrong, you might just make it worse. I’ll be back in a little while.”

“What if you’re not?”

She gave him a withering look. “The Doctor would never hurt me. You know that.”

“No, I know that. The angriest he ever gets is when he thinks you’re in danger. I mean, what if you get…” he waggled his eyebrows, “...distracted.”

“Distracted?”

Jack looked at her knowingly. “With all that sexy Time Lord goodness wrapped up in a tux, I know I’d probably get distracted.”

Rose swatted his arm, flushing. “You know that’s never gonna happen.” 

“I know no such thing,” Jack disagreed, his face a mask of seriousness. “You two are crazy about each other, and the sooner you figure that out - and actually _do_ something about it - the better off everyone will be.”

She rolled her eyes, her face still warm. “Whatever.”

“Go on.” He gave her a playful shove. “Go. Find out what’s wrong. But for God’s sake, kiss the poor bastard.” 

Rose ignored that last and stood on tiptoe to kiss Jack’s cheek. “I’ll be back.”

Jack gave her a lascivious look. “No you won’t. But I’ll be by the TARDIS later.”

She just waved over her shoulder and crossed the ballroom under the colorful, sparkling sky.


	2. Spark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tenroseforeverandever says I should only post once a day, but since I'm impatient and rebellious (plus I have a new multichap starting on Monday), I'll probably throw them up just a bit faster than that. Depends on how rebellious I feel. :D

The Doctor wasn’t tired, but he was debating going to bed anyway. He could be miserable there just as well as anywhere else, and the chances were better that he’d be left alone in his bedroom. He didn’t want to see anyone, didn’t want to talk to anyone. 

Well, that was a lie. He wanted to talk to Rose, wanted to see her, wanted to feel her hand in his, wanted to hear her laugh. He wanted to feel the way his stomach swooped when she turned her brilliant smile towards _him_.

That was the crux of this problem, wasn’t it? He _didn’t_ want to be alone, no matter what lies he told himself. He wanted Rose with him, by him, beside him, always. His equal, his partner, his...mate. 

He tugged on the tie, loosening it, letting it hang around his neck. If Rose only knew what she did to him, how she affected him, how she made him crazy, she’d…

_What?_

Even in his mind, he couldn’t finish that sentence in any kind of way that made sense. If he’d been able to get the words out, she’d think he meant something else. Surely the ancient Time Lord didn’t think about _her_ that way, she’d think. And when she figured out that yes, in fact, he _did_ think about her in just _that_ way, she’d be horrified and embarrassed. Maybe she’d pity him. Perhaps she’d laugh, although even in his misery he doubted that. His Rose was too kind, too good. 

But she wasn’t too good for self-preservation, and the best thing she could do for herself would be to get away from the lecherous old bastard who was completely besotted with her. She’d want nothing to do with him if she knew, and she’d be right to leave. His Rose was smart enough to know that. 

He dragged a hand down his face. He really had to stop thinking of her as ‘his’. Rose was her own woman, only too capable of making her own choices. He didn’t own her - and he didn’t want to. Not really. Not in the way some men tried to own their women. He wanted to be the sole proprietor of her heart, though. _That_ he wanted to own. He wanted her to love him.

And she did, in her way. He didn’t doubt that she cared about him, cared deeply. But he was equally sure that the pheromones she kept dumping out were due to...some other cause. He usually attributed it to someone nearby, most recently Jack. Not him. Never him. Not with this daft old face. 

She would never want him. How could she?

Stupid, stupid Time Lord. 

The Doctor thought of Rose, who even at that moment was dancing in the arms of Jack Harkness. Jack was good-looking, charming, suave, and romantic. All of the things that the Doctor wasn’t. And even at that moment, the Captain was holding the sole desire of the Doctor’s hearts close to him, reveling in the glory of having rescued her from that pillock of a sergeant who’d tried to corner her. He’d been there at the exact moment Rose had needed someone and had been exactly what she needed. Jack had been Rose’s hero, while the Doctor stood on the sidelines, watching helplessly. 

Jack. Jack was one of those rare blokes that was just...lucky. His swagger was well-deserved, because he could back it up with deeds. It seemed that Jack didn’t even have to try most of the time. Good things just happened to him, and when things _did_ go pear-shaped, Jack didn’t fall apart. He met the challenge head-on. 

Everyone loved him and most wanted to be him. He was unflappable, brilliant, and just... a lucky guy. 

The Doctor wanted to hate him. He wanted to, but he couldn’t. Because in the time since Rose had convinced him to bring the Captain on board, the Doctor had learned that Jack also had a heart of gold beneath all that swagger. He was a good man with good intentions. Jack hadn’t gone over to Rose tonight and pulled her away from that fuckwit looking for glory, he’d been genuinely concerned about Rose’s well-being. Jack was a good guy, and he’d been acting as such. 

That just made the Doctor feel worse. If Jack had been trying to show off, if he’d been acting with selfish intent, if he’d been peacocking around, the Doctor could have justified a nice little fit of incandescent rage to himself and chucked Jack straight out of the TARDIS at the next stop. He couldn’t have someone selfish and dangerously arrogant around his Rose. He’d gotten rid of Adam, he could get rid of Jack, too. 

But there was no need to get rid of Jack. His urge to take care of and protect Rose was almost as strong as the Doctor’s, and the Doctor couldn’t fault him for that. He even appreciated it, as much as he also resented it.

But it was breaking his hearts to see her rely on someone else, to look at them with shining, grateful eyes. She didn’t need two men falling all over themselves to keep her safe, keep her close. 

It was time for the Doctor to give up any dream of having Rose, and he knew it. He needed to figure out some way to block his love and desire for her. Maybe he should try meditation, or some form of self-hypnosis. He’d have to look into whether or not the library had any books on the subject. There had to be something. 

Later. For now, he put his hands on the console and leaned over, letting his head hang, his chin almost touching his chest, the burden of his jealousy and defeat pushing down on his shoulders like a physical weight. 

He wished Jack and Rose would hurry up and come back to the TARDIS so he could pilot them away from this planet. Again, he contemplated going to bed. They could leave in the morning. 

The Doctor wasn’t tired. But he was _tired._

~*~O~*~

Rose opened the door to the TARDIS and took in the console room, looking for the Doctor. She didn’t see him, so she stepped inside, letting the door swing shut behind her and started up the ramp slowly. 

“Doctor?”

“Go away, Rose.”

Her eyes sought out his voice and found him by the console, his hands resting on it, head bowed, shoulders slumped. She’d rarely seen him this downtrodden - not since Utah, actually - and it alarmed her to see him this way now. She moved up the ramp with purpose, tossing her sheer, beaded wrap over the rail on the way. 

She was beside him in a moment, but he hadn’t stirred. She came to a stop a few inches away from him and reached a hand towards him before pulling it back. He hadn’t even looked at her. 

“I said go away, Rose. You’re missing the party.” 

His voice was dull, there was none of his usual emotion to it - positive or negative. He sounded...flat. Defeated.

She put her hand on his shoulder then and he flinched a little. Rose cringed at his reaction, but didn’t remove her hand. 

“What’s wrong, Doctor?”

“Nothin’, Rose. M’alright. M’always alright.”

Rose stroked her hand down his back and then back up. “That’s rubbish. Something is clearly bothering you. Tell me what it is. Maybe I can help fix it.”

He gave a mirthless little huff of a laugh, shaking his bowed head, then looking up at the console. “You’re amazin’, you are. D’you know that, Rose Tyler? Always trying to fix what’s broken. But I’m afraid you can’t this time.” He lowered his head again. “I’m much too big of a mess for you to even bother with.”

Rose ground her teeth, then schooled her voice to be gentle, sensing that her anger on his behalf wouldn’t help him now. “That’s even more rubbish,” she answered, her hand still stroking his back. 

“S’true, Rose. Why I ever thought…” He shook his head and sniffed, and Rose wondered wildly if he’d been crying. He pushed himself off of the console, though, and turned to face her. “Nevermind,” he said with a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “You should go, Rose. Go back to the party. Seemed fun.”

Rose shook her head. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I want to know what’s wrong with you. I want to help.”

He looked away from her, over her head at nothing, then back down to his shining black shoes. He leaned back against the console and crossed his arms. Rose recognized this posture as him getting defensive, but he didn’t seem angry. He seemed sad. Resigned. 

She stepped forward and put her hand back on his arm, stroking the black fabric of the tux lightly, missing the usual leather. He didn’t look up. Rose let her hand slide up to his shoulder and took a step closer. 

“Doctor,” she began. He didn’t acknowledge her, still didn’t look up. 

Still quiet, she went on. “We did a good thing here, Doctor.”

“I know that, Rose.”

“We helped these people.”

“Yes. We did. You were brilliant.”

“That’s not what’s bothering you?”

He gave a little shake of his head, still staring at the mirror shine of his shoes. 

“Then what is it?”

“Rose…” He still had that same flat, defeated voice. “Even if I could tell you, you wouldn’t want to hear it. You should really go back to the party.” 

“I told you, I only wanted to be there if you were going to be with me.” She stepped in front of him, putting her free hand on his other shoulder and considering them, carefully. 

“You feel everything so keenly, Doctor,” she fairly whispered. “The weight of the universe rests on these shoulders.” She gave them a light squeeze, then ducked her head in an unsuccessful bid to catch his eye. “But you don’t have to bear the burden alone. You can share it with me.”

The Doctor scoffed. “I’d never sully you like that, Rose. My shoulders are just fine.”

“You’re not alone, Doctor. There’s me.”

He shook his head and raised up, looking over her shoulder again, refusing to meet her eyes. She could see the conflict on his face, in the blue depths that were staring at nothing, and she wanted nothing more than to make him smile, to take all of his pain as her own, to kiss away anything that would ever dare hurt him. 

“But I am alone.”

“Doctor,” she began again, ready to disabuse him of that notion, but he interrupted.

“I’m the most powerful being in the universe, Rose. Did you know? Time Lords were legends for a reason, and the vast majority of the legends were true. We didn’t interfere much because we _were_ so powerful. Now they’re all gone, I’m alone, I’m the last one, and that makes _me_ the single most powerful being in all of time and space.”

Rose knew that - at least she’d suspected it. She’d known he was the last of his kind, and she’d seen him do things that some would consider miraculous. But to her, he was just the Doctor. _Her_ Doctor. Her friend, her protector, her secret love. 

“I shouldn’t tell you any of this. I think my brain may finally have been fried by holding all of it back too long.”

“Holding what back?”

He stood up straight and she took a step back, allowing him room. He moved around her and started to pace: Rose turned to watch him. 

“I tell myself no. I tell myself that it’s a bad idea, that it’s a _fantastically_ bad idea.” He walked a few steps, then he turned back around to retrace his steps. Back then forth. Back then forth. “I’m still telling myself that. My brain is screaming it at me, in fact.”

He brought his hands up to scrub at his head, then dragged them down his face, still pacing. 

Impatience was starting to crowd Rose’s worry. “Tell your brain to shut it, then, and tell me what’s wrong.” Seeing him agitated like this was worrying her a great deal, but her worry was solely for him. Her determination to find out what was troubling him, to get to the root of it, then to take it all away was growing more and more firm with every step he took. 

The Doctor walked to the railing, placing his hands on either side of the foam, and bowed his head again. “I can’t,” he nearly whimpered. “You’ll leave me, and I couldn’t bear it if you did.”

Rose felt a flash of anger and stomped over to him. “You listen to me, Doctor, and listen well. I am _never_ gonna leave you, do you hear me? _Never_. You’ve told me the worst thing you ever did, but did that make me want to leave you? No!” He flinched, just as she’d suspected he would, and she softened. She turned, putting her bottom against the railing beside his hand, leaning against him a little, then took his face - his daft, beloved face - into her hands. He turned his head towards her obediently, but didn’t open his eyes. 

“Look at me, Doctor.”

Slowly, as if it pained him, he opened them, and her eyes found his. The blue of his eyes was an emotional maelstrom, and Rose couldn’t even begin to pick out everything she was seeing there. She knew that what she was seeing in that moment was him laid bare, stripped to the bone. He was hiding nothing. This was the Doctor. He looked like a man in howling pain, in desperate fear, but there was a softness there for her. She decided to use that softness to try to get through to him. 

“I am _never_ going to leave you,” she repeated in a fierce, quiet voice. “So get that thought right out of your magnificent Time Lord brain. You’re stuck with me, you are, for as long as you’ll let me stay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This song was playing when I wrote the section about Jack:  
>  _Some people don't seem real at all/ unafraid of any mountain_  
>  _Sure that the gods won't let him fall/ should he fall, he will always get up again_  
>  _And if he's hurt he never shows it, if he's wrong nobody knows it_  
>  _Seems like he never has to try, he just be a lucky guy_  
>  _And when there's pain he neverminds it, when it's lost he always finds it_  
>  _Nobody really knows just why, he just must be a lucky guy_  
>  _I wish I was that lucky guy._  
>  It reminded me of Jack, and how the Doctor may feel when he thought about his friend.


	3. Sizzle

Previously: _The blue of his eyes was an emotional maelstrom, and Rose couldn’t even begin to pick out everything she was seeing there. She knew that what she was seeing in that moment was him laid bare, stripped to the bone. He was hiding nothing. This was the Doctor. He looked like a man in howling pain, in desperate fear, but there was a softness there for her. She decided to use that softness to try to get through to him._  
 _“I am never going to leave you,” she repeated in a fierce, quiet voice. “So get that thought right out of your magnificent Time Lord brain. You’re stuck with me, you are, for as long as you’ll let me stay.”_

His eyes searched hers and she let him, willing him to see the truth she was telling. The moment stretched out, grew longer, and Rose could almost see the thoughts swirling around behind his eyes, a decision forming there behind the fear. 

“I’m not leaving, Doctor. Nothing you could say will make me leave,” she whispered, fighting the urge to pepper his face with kisses, settling for opening her arms and praying silently that he’d take the invitation. 

He did, and Rose folded her arms around his shoulders as he buried his face into the crook between her shoulder and neck. She brought her hand up to thread her fingers in the short, surprisingly soft hair at the back of his head, stroking gently. 

“I can’t believe that,” he whispered into her bare shoulder. “I’m _afraid_ to believe that. Because if I do…”

“I’m here, no matter what,” she murmured, the truth of that promise pouring from every cell in her body. “No matter what.”

They were silent in each other’s embrace for a long moment. The Doctor took deep breaths, as if to steady himself, and Rose rocked him slightly. His hands were on her back, and she could feel his fingers flexing a little into the her flesh above the dress and the slightly duller sensation of his fingers flexing below the material. 

“M’so proud of you, Rose,” he murmured. “Just so bloody proud. It swells my hearts to bursting that you’d travel with an old man like me.”

Rose scoffed, but he went on. 

“I mean it, Rose. You’re amazin’. I’m in awe of you, every day.”

“M’nothin’ special, Doctor.”

“But you are, Rose Tyler. You’re…” He broke off and didn’t say anything for a moment, and Rose rocked her head back to look at him, her heart doing a funny little dance in sync with the jittering of her stomach. 

“I’m what, Doctor?”

He regarded her for a long moment, then leaned forward. Rose watched him, letting her eyes flick down to his lips, barely parted and moving towards hers. A tiny, involuntary gasp escaped her, and the spell was broken. His eyes opened and Rose saw at once that the moment had been lost. His eyes were shuttered, hard, almost angry. 

“No,” he snapped, pushing away from her, resuming his pacing. “No. Stupid, stupid Time Lord.”

Rose still felt a little dizzy from the almost-kiss and unsteady on her feet after losing his comforting, steadying presence beside her.

“Doctor?”

“Most powerful being in the universe, me,” he muttered, not looking at her. “And I’ve got a chink in my armor you could fly a TARDIS through.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Gonna destroy me, one way or another. I'll not make it out of this intact.”

Rose clenched her fists. “I am _not_ going to let anything hurt you, Doctor. Not if it's remotely within my power to stop it. _I_ certainly won’t ever hurt you. I could never. Now please, _tell me what's wrong._ ”

He stopped and looked at her. His eyes were searching, probing. Intense.

“Not going to leave this alone, are you? You’ll keep naggin’ me until I spill my guts.”

“Yeah,” she answered, chin tipped up. “I want to know what’s going on, Doctor.”

She could almost see the gears turning in his mind, until his face softened just a bit. Rose could see the fear mingled with vulnerability and hope, and knew that something had shifted in him. He watched her for a few more seconds, his eyes boring into hers, then seemed to come to some sort of a decision with an almost imperceptible nod of his head and flex of his jaw. He wore the same look he got when he’d resolved himself to something, but his eyes were still vulnerable. Rose didn’t understand the mix of emotions she was seeing in him: calm yet unsettled, determined yet afraid.

The Doctor started towards her with slow, deliberate steps, his voice low. “I’ve got a weakness. A soft underbelly. And there’s nothing I can do about it.”

Rose narrowed her eyes, confused, and shook her head at him. “I don’t understand…”

“You have me wrapped around your little finger, Rose Tyler, ready to do your bidding. What will you do with that kind of power?”

“Me?” she squeaked.

He gave a little chuckle. “Yes, you. I can’t tell you no; can’t deny you anything, me. You’ve known that for a while. I know you have.”

Rose had wondered, had thought, had hoped. He always seemed eager to please her, but she’d never dreamed… Her head was spinning.

What did all of this mean? She was madly in love with him, had been for months. But as close as they were, there was a part of him that always seemed so distant. Untouchable. 

Surely he couldn’t mean what she wanted him to mean. He seemed to be implying that she…. No. That couldn't be it. He must be teasing her in some odd way, and something about that felt cruel. Rose felt her hopes rising, and tried viciously to tamp them down. It wasn’t possible that he meant that he.... No. No, she couldn’t allow herself to entertain that thought at all. That would only lead to her ruin. He couldn’t possibly mean that he loved her, too.

_Or could he?_

She opened her mouth to answer him, trying to remember the question. Was there a question? There were certainly questions chasing each other in her brain. 

The Doctor took another step toward her, his hands raised and extended just a little, as if to catch her if she fell. Rose looked down at them, struck dumb, studying his fingers and remembering the time he played the musical instrument in Van Staten’s bunker, how she’d envied that stupid little thing in his hands, imagined what his hands would feel like if they were stroking _her_.

“Surely you’ve noticed, love,” he chided gently, and Rose’s head snapped up. _Love?_

“I - I don’t…”

He continued his slow approach until he was right in front of her, and he reached for her hips with slow, tentative motions. He plucked at the beaded fabric a little, pulling their bodies infinitesimally closer to one another. Rose looked up into his eyes, and there was a question there. But he was smiling: a small, soft thing. 

“You don’t what?” he queried.

Rose didn’t have words at her command at that moment, not in the face of his soft gaze, this look she’d only seen from him in brief, unguarded moments and thought she’d probably imagined.

She wasn’t imagining now. The Doctor was looking down at her expectantly, his features softened, his eyes crinkling a little. 

“You don’t know what you do to me? You don’t know what I feel for you?” He rumbled a laugh to himself. “You have quite the effect on me, Rose Tyler. Across the board. Mentally, emotionally and physically. Bit confusing, that. Scared me.”

Rose tried to imagine the Doctor afraid, scared by something she did to him, but found that she couldn’t. 

“I checked myself out in the infirmary, even.” He used his head to indicate the path down the corridor, where the infirmary was, but his hands didn’t leave her sides where his thumbs had started stroking. “Thought surely I must be having some kind of chemical reaction or an allergy. Would have made more sense, I thought. But really, I just didn’t want to believe my own mind, my own hearts. I wasn't ready to accept that what I was feeling is what it is.”

“What is it?” Rose choked out.

He grinned down at her. “You’re a clever girl, Rose. The most clever human I’ve ever known. I’m sure you have at least _some_ idea what I’m talking about.”

Rose gaped up at him. From any other bloke, she’d be certain that this some sort of a declaration of love. But this _wasn’t_ any other bloke. This was _the Doctor_. And he just didn’t…

“You can’t mean that you…”

“I do,” he assured her with a smile. 

“You’re saying that _you_ …?”

“Yes, me.” He smiled, indulgent and playful.

“You want...you want _me_?”

“See? I knew you were clever,” he joked, bringing up one finger to tap her nose. 

Rose felt panic rising within her, a fear that she couldn’t name clawing its way up the back of her throat and bringing tears to her eyes. She wanted what he was saying to be true - oh, how she wanted it to be true - but… 

“But you _can’t_ , Doctor!”

He looked mildly affronted, and Rose didn’t miss the disappointment and stark fear in his eyes. “Can, too.”

“No.” She tried to reason with him. “You _can’t._ Like you said, you’re a Time Lord, all mighty and powerful, yeah? And I’m just -”

Rose didn’t get to finish because the Doctor’s lips had crashed into hers. She froze for a moment - only a moment - then she relaxed, feeling him do the same. His lips slid over hers, and the soft, smooth motions of his mouth against hers smoothed the furrowing in her brow, as well. She abandoned herself to him, clutching his biceps, blazing with love. 

The initial urgency died, and the Doctor broke the kiss, pulling back to look at her. His eyes were searching, questioning, but Rose met them head on with a fierce, determined look. Slowly, so slowly, without ever taking his eyes from hers, he brought his hand up to her face, cradling her cheek in his palm. Rose’s eyes fluttered closed at the contact and she leaned into the touch. She thought she’d die from the sensation of his cool hand sliding backwards into her hair and the air from his lungs ghosting her lips. 

“Rose,” he breathed, then brought his mouth back down to hers, brushing them together. 

Rose couldn’t stop the little sound that escaped her throat when he moved his lips against hers, and he pulled her a little closer. He parted her lips but barely breached them, preferring instead to give her small, sipping kisses, to intimate himself to her slowly, to plead his hearts’ case with nibbles to her lower lip. She responded to him just as she had from the first moment she’d met him: by following where he led. She leaned into him, bringing her arms up around his neck tentatively, afraid to spook him, afraid he’d run. 

He broke the kiss, putting his forehead to hers, and she bit her lip while she tried to catch her breath. 

“I’ve tried to run away from this, Rose,” he murmured, pressing a little kiss to the tip of her nose. “Tried to hide from it, me. But then I look at you, and I just...all the thoughts…”

“What thoughts?”

He stroked her cheek with his thumb. Rose could feel his roughened skin against hers, scraping just a little bit as it slid, and she fought down a shiver. 

“So many thoughts, all of them different. It’s a huge jumble in an otherwise magnificent brain. What I want, what I shouldn’t want, what I can never have. Should never ask for.”

“You should,” she whispered. 

“What I’ll say, what you’ll do if I say it. What I want to do, and how you’ll hate me if I do.”

“I could never hate you, Doctor. Never.”

“Say no,” he implored her. “Tell me to stop. Tell me I’m an old lecher and a fool. Tell me to leave you alone, tell me to take you home.”

Rose huffed a little laugh then, just a breath, and pulled her head away from his to look him in the eye. 

“Tell your brain to sod off.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter goes up this evening.


	4. Launch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The beginnings of smut.

Previously:  
_“Say no,” he implored her. “Tell me to stop. Tell me I’m an old lecher and a fool. Tell me to leave you alone, tell me to take you home.”_  
_Rose huffed a little laugh then, just a breath, and pulled her head away from his to look him in the eye._  
_“Tell your brain to sod off.”_

 

“Rose…”

She put a finger on his lips. “Tell. Your brain. To sod off,” she enunciated very clearly. “I don’t want to hear it.”

The Doctor looked so hopeful, she thought her heart might break. He brought both hands up to where her finger rested against her mouth and cupped her hand, kissing the tip of her finger and bringing it down, still cradling it in his hands. 

“Is that what was bothering you?” she asked. “Is that what set you off tonight?” 

“Not exactly.”

“What was it?” Her voice was quiet and undemanding when she asked the question, but she felt him tense at whatever memory it brought up. She didn’t offer him an out, though; she wanted to know what had caused him such distress. If she knew, she may be able to fix it. 

“I saw you dancin’,” he told her after a while, putting his hands on her waist as if he wanted to demonstrate. “Every bloke in the place wanted to dance with you, Rose, and...well, no exception, me.”

Rose slipped her arms around his neck. “Why didn’t you?”

“You were busy.” She could see clouds skirting his eyes. “Your dance card was full.” 

She smiled, amused that something this simple had been the problem. This, she could fix. “I’d have thrown any of them over for you. All of them. All you had to do was ask.”

His eyes softened, then darkened again. “I saw that Ryn bastard try to cage you in after your dance with him.” 

Rose brought one hand to his cheek to soothe him, giving him a gentle smile, then slid her hands around to the back of his neck to play with the skin above his collar. “Jack was there. He sorted it. The soldier didn’t hurt me.”

“That’s my point, Rose,” he told her, sounding anguished. “ _Jack_ was there. I didn’t want it to be _Jack_ , I wanted it to be _me!_ ”

She looked up at him, nonplussed. “You were jealous of _Jack_?” The Doctor looked away from her and Rose’s confusion grew. “But he’s… _Jack_.”

“Exactly. It’s _Jack_.” He looked back down at her, and his face had hardened now. His shoulders and neck were stiff under her hands, and tension radiated from him. 

Rose tried to keep a straight face, but failed. First a grin tried to break through, but she bit her lip to keep it back. She failed, and a giggle escaped. It was just so funny to her, the Doctor jealous of Jack. 

The Doctor didn’t find it so funny. He pulled away from her, disgusted. Rose released him, although she tried to follow, to explain herself, her laughter dead now. 

“Doctor, I didn’t mean...I just...I thought we were past that!”

He spun around to face her. “Past what? Past the fact that there’s a daring, dashing captain on board who’s a better fit for you in every way possible? Past the fact that he’s a master of seduction and turning people’s heads? All he would have to do is set his sights on you, and…” He didn’t finish, but brought his hands up to his eyes. “Meanwhile, I look at you and go completely mad…” He scrubbed his face and pulled at his cheeks, blowing out a breath. “No, Rose. I’m not over you and Jack.”

The last two words flipped a switch inside Rose, and she suddenly tensed. Angry. “There is no _me and Jack_ ,” she ground out. 

“Jack came to your rescue tonight,” he reasoned. “He was there before I could even get across the ballroom, and then he spun you out onto the dancefloor.” 

“He was getting me away from the soldier!” she fairly shouted. 

“ _I_ wanted to do that for you, Rose!” he shouted right back, then deflated. “ _I_ wanted to be what you needed. _Me_. Not Jack.”

Rose took a step forward, then another, laying her hand flat on his chest between his hearts. “You _are_ what I need, Doctor.”

He just looked at her, incredulous, then dipped his head and tasted her lips again. She opened to him at once and he brought his arms around her. Rose sighed against his mouth. Relief flooded her: she was back in the place she felt safest. His hearts beat a syncopated rhythm on each side of her hand, a bit faster than usual. She brought her free hand up so that she could cover each one. She explored his mouth a little more, and he moaned appreciatively before he dove into her himself, claiming her. 

Rose melted into him - couldn’t help it, really - and he clutched her closer, holding her as near as he could, as close as she’d always dreamed of. His hands spread and flexed on her back, making Rose wonder just how much he was holding back. 

She didn’t want him to hold back at all. 

She curled her own hands, gripping the lapels of his tuxedo jacket, even with her arms still folded between them. She wasn’t entirely sure why she did it: perhaps she just wanted him as close as humanly possible and was just doing her part. Perhaps she was still afraid of him running, and was determined to keep him with her. After all, his first word to her had been ‘run’, and he was exceptionally skilled at running from danger. He’d said he was afraid of her, but if he ran away from this now... 

He broke the kiss and dragged his lips, feather-light, across her cheek, down to her neck. Rose leaned her head back, offering herself up to him, and he made a needy little sound in the back of his throat as he took her up on her unspoken invitation. 

“Rose?” he murmured against the skin of her neck.

She bit her lip, squeezing her eyes tight, sure she knew what was coming. This had been too good, a fantasy come to life, and it simply couldn’t last. Her luck and his natural inclination to run would not allow something this good to last. She knew it, and it terrified her.

Instead of saying anything, she simply made an inquisitive sound. His voice rumbled against her throat. 

“I want to make love to you, Rose. I want to hold you and touch you and make you fall apart for me. But only if you want me to.”

“God, yes,” she breathed, clutching his lapels tighter. 

“Once we start doing this, Rose, I won’t ever want to stop. I won’t ever want to spend another night alone in my bed. I’ll want you beside me, I’ll want you there when I wake.”

“Fine by me.” She smiled at the ceiling of the cathedral-like console room. 

“You’re sure?” He raised his head to look at her, assessing, searching for reassurance. 

She regarded him for a second. “Doctor?”

“Yes, Rose?”

“Less talking, more of this.” She rolled her hips against him to emphasize what she meant. 

He made the same needy sound as before, and Rose started devising ways to have him make that sound again. She was ready for him, accepting him with her mouth and bringing her arms up to loop around his neck, symbolically accepting him with her body. 

Her words had apparently emboldened his hands, and they went on a bit of a wander. Moving from their place on her back, she felt one slide up her side towards her breast and the other drifted lower, to her bum. She could feel the press of his erection against her belly, through her dress and his trousers. And oh, wouldn’t that feel brilliant with _nothing_ between them? But she wasn’t entirely confident yet that he wouldn’t run. They’d done this hot and cold routine for months, after all; she’d hoped and daydreamed that they were getting close to some sort of breakthrough beyond the covert, heated looks and excessive hand-holding, then he’d pull back. He always pulled back, and she didn’t think she could bear it if he did this time. Just because they’d gone further than they’d ever gone - they’d never gone anywhere _near_ this far before - didn’t mean that he was ready for what _she_ was ready for. No matter what he said.

Experimentally, she raised one foot and kicked her high heel off. He noticed the change in her height that pulled her lips away from his and gave her a quizzical look. 

“Doesn’t make sense to do this with shoes on,” she said by way of explanation with a grin. 

It seemed to dawn on him what she was doing, and he gave her a lascivious smile, almost a smirk. “No, shoes would just get in the way, wouldn’t they?” She felt his body shift and looked down to see that he was toeing off his own shoes and kicking them aside. Rose took off her other red heel, sending it flying a few feet away. She took advantage of the broken kiss to put her hands back to his chest, sliding them up and out to get rid of his tuxedo jacket. Slowly, her eyes never leaving his, she brought her hands up to his shoulders and slipped the jacket down onto his arms. It fell to his biceps. He released her, letting it fall to his forearms before he caught it, tossing it to parts unknown. 

Rose wasted no time before catching his head between both of her hands and claiming his mouth again. Once his hands were free, he put them back on her, where they belonged, and _thank God_. It looked like they were actually going to do this. 

The Doctor kneaded her bum, pulling her into him, grinding himself into her. Rose thought she’d die from the sensation of him hard for her. She’d dreamed of this for so long, so many nights, so many times staring at him while he did something fantastic, that the reality of it was nearly overwhelming. 

She pulled her head away, gasping for air, and the Doctor didn’t bother with her neck this time. His mouth went straight to her chest, teeth nibbling at the tops of her breasts revealed by her low-cut dress, leaning her back a bit in his ardor. She groaned, her fingers still carded through his short hair, and felt his hands seek out the zip of her dress in the back. 

“This needs to go,” he growled, lowering the zipper methodically, torturously slow. Once he got the zipper down to her waist, he slid his hand back around, using one finger to tug down the front of her dress, letting it fall to the place where their hips were pressed snugly together , baring her. He gaped at the red strapless bra, and she thanked herself for choosing it earlier in the day. 

“The knickers match,” she teased.

His eyes left her chest long enough to meet hers for a moment, and she let her tongue appear at the corner of her mouth. His hands came up to cup her over the lace and he went back to staring at her breasts in his hands, apparently fascinated by the way they moved under his massaging hands. He still didn't speak, and Rose grew a little self-conscious. “Alright?” She bit her lip a little.

His eyes snapped back up to hers just a second before his mouth descended, snogging her furiously. She met every invasion of his tongue by stroking it with her own, and he moaned into her mouth while his hands kept up their sensual assault on her breasts. He let his thumb graze her nipples and Rose shivered. He returned his mouth to take the place of his thumbs, laving her areola through the lace and attempting to suck her into his mouth despite the cloth in his way. 

“Fantastic,” he breathed, and Rose shivered again from the cool air blowing against the wet fabric in one of her most erogenous zones. 

This position was brilliant but problematic. His hips were providing delicious friction against hers; it was fantastic, but it wasn’t what she wanted. Not at the moment. She wanted to feel his bare skin against hers, wanted to smooth her hands across the hard planes she found there, and his shirt was still in the way. 

“Stand up,” she ordered, and reveled in the glazed look he was wearing when he obeyed. Almost immediately, however, he looked confused, worried, as if he were afraid her command was actually a rejection. 

She smiled to soothe him, reaching up to pull the loosened bow tie free and toss it over her shoulder before she set out to work on his buttons, her fingers flying. She stood on tiptoe to kiss his exposed adams apple, even as she worked. 

“Are you gonna take me right here against the console?” she whispered just before she applied her lips to his pulse point. 

She could feel his throat work under her tongue when he swallowed heavily. “Nuh-uh,” he denied, gripping her hips tightly, clutching them, rutting against her. “Not our first time. But tempted to, me.”

As Rose’s hand closed in on the last of the buttons he turned his head, denying her his neck, intercepting her lips with his own. His kiss was sweeter this time, slower, and he seemed to be trembling. She wondered if he was still holding back. She was in serious trouble if he was...this kiss was curling her bare toes against the grating. 

He peppered soft, chaste kisses all across her face towards her neck and Rose’s ability to focus on untucking the tails of his shirt wavered as she gasped for breath against his shoulder, biting down in an effort to control herself. 

“Gonna take me time,” he muttered against her clavicle. “Been waiting too long to rush it. Love you too much to do anything but worship you before I make love to you.”

Rose went stock-still and pushed his shoulders back so she could look at him. It was her turn to gape now, staring at him in frank disbelief. 

“You love me?” she fairly squeaked, shock ricocheting through every part of her body. 

“You’re surprised?” he countered.

“Well, yeah!”

He tilted his head at her, a half smile on his daft, beloved face. “Don’t see why, love. Bloody besotted with you, me. Have been for ages. Since Cardiff, 1869 and that damnable dress.”

She just stared at him and only realized her mouth was hanging open when he looped one finger and brought it to her chin, closing her mouth before kissing it sweetly. 

“This is not just a shag to me, Rose Tyler. You’re far too important to me. This, what we’re about to do, this isn’t just sex. This is me showing you just how much I love you the only way I know how, showing you what you mean to me. Baring myself to you, literally and figuratively.” He kissed her again, a little more ardently this time, then pulled away and kissed the tip of her nose. 

“I love you, Rose,” he told her. “S’why it makes me mental to see all those other blokes hanging around, tryin’ to get your attention. S’why it bothered me that Jack was there to protect you and not me. Because I love you.”

Rose felt sudden, unbidden tears prick in the back of her eyes. Her hands were still clutched on the bottom of his shirt while she tried to process everything he’d just said. 

“That alright?” he asked, sounding more than a little insecure. 

She let out a laugh, couldn’t stop it. A tear splashed to her cheek. “I love you too, you daft thing. Have done for ages.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ripped off "you daft thing" from UntemperedSchism because I loved it so much. If you're reading, I hope you'll forgive me!
> 
> Chapter 5 and 6 are going up at the same time tomorrow morning, folks. Thank you for reading!!


	5. Detonation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our story earns its rating.

_“I love you, Rose,” he told her. “S’why it makes me mental to see all those other blokes hanging around, tryin’ to get your attention. S’why it bothered me that Jack was there to protect you and not me. Because I love you.”_  
_Rose felt sudden, unbidden tears prick in the back of her eyes. Her hands were still clutched on the bottom of his shirt while she tried to process everything he’d just said._  
_“That alright?” he asked, sounding more than a little insecure._  
_She let out a laugh, couldn’t stop it. A tear splashed to her cheek. “I love you too, you daft thing. Have done for ages.”_

 

The Doctor stared at her for a moment, and knew that he was gaping. Pheromones were simply pheromones. Sex hormones. And humans excelled at separating sex from love. His little human girl from long ago was just that: human. How could she love him? 

But she did. Even without his telepathy, he felt love and acceptance radiating from the look she was giving him, and it rocked him. Could she…?

He blinked. “You love me, too?” 

She just nodded. 

“Rose Tyler, you never stop amazin’ me.” He pulled her back and cupped her cheek, sliding his thumb along her lips. She loved him. She loved _him!_ He’d never heard of anything more fantastic than those three little words falling from her mouth. 

“Say it again,” he commanded in a husky voice. 

She smiled at him and leaned into his touch. “I love you,” she whispered. 

His hearts tripped over each other, and he brushed his lips against hers. “Again?” A request this time, soft and quiet. 

“I love you, Doctor. Love you so much.”

He kissed her, his lips sliding over hers, feeling her responses to him and reveling in them. He’d never dreamed he’d ever be able to kiss her, that she’d allow such a thing. Now she was not only permitting his touches, she was welcoming them, whimpering for more. 

It occurred to him that they’d been in the middle of something, but bugger if he knew what. The feel of her pressed against him was shorting out his frankly magnificent brain. She arched into him and he - oh! Yes! They were getting rid of the clothes in their way. 

He let go of her and pulled his shirt off, baring his chest to her, just as he had bared his soul. Rose pulled her head back when she realized what he’d done, looking at him, putting her hands on the skin he’d just uncovered. She looked at him for so long that he began to get self-conscious. Just as he was about to speak, Rose bent forward, pressing kisses against his chest. He moaned a little, holding her shoulders. Her lips were hot against his cool skin, and he wanted more of that. Everywhere. 

“Rose,” he croaked, and he really should have been embarrassed by the way his voice sounded, but he just couldn’t care when her tongue was ringing his nipple like that. 

“Hmm?”

“I think we should take this somewhere else, or I just _might_ have you against the console. And I don’t want that.” He bent his head to nip at her earlobe. “At least not this time,” he whispered. 

“You can have me anyway you want me,” she promised, her breath hot against his shoulder. 

He clutched her a little tighter and realized that the tenuous grasp on his control was becoming weaker and weaker with every slide of skin against skin.

The Doctor reached up and took her hand from his shoulder, stepping away from her and tugging it a little. “Let’s go.”

She looked up at him from beneath her lashes. “My bedroom or yours, Doctor?”

He stopped, lowering his head and catching that tongue that was peeking at him, inviting it into his mouth. 

“How about we make it _our_ room?” he murmured, ignoring the fluttering in his chest that definitely wasn’t nerves. Definitely not. 

Rose beamed up at him. “‘ _Our room_ ’. I like the sound of that.”

Relief flooded him. “Yeah?”

She nudged her shoulder into him, her hand still grasped in his. “Let’s go.”

He wasn’t about to refuse such an offer. He bent down, scooping a squealing Rose into his arms and started towards the bedroom, carrying her. She arched her back to bring her lips closer to his and it was yet another invitation he couldn’t refuse. Their lips met, and it was a heated, desperate thing, passion overflowing from their lips since their hands were otherwise occupied. 

The Doctor stumbled over a discarded shoe and Rose clutched his shoulders - which was fortunate, because he nearly dropped her. Once they were both assured that they would remain upright, they burst into laughter. Rose’s giggle was like tinkling music, inspiring his own rumbling baritone. They stayed like that for a few moments, holding each other in the console room, laughing like loons, half-dressed. 

“I think that maybe we should try something else, get there another way,” he suggested. 

Rose looked positively devilish. “Perhaps we should.”

He lowered her to the ground, delighting in the little giggle she gave, then catching it in his mouth. He walked her backwards towards the corridor, hands roaming, the expanse of skin on her back interrupted by the band of her bra. 

_Well,_ he decided, _that needs to go._ What he had available to his hands was lovely, wonderful, _fantastic_ , but he wanted more - greedy bastard that he was. 

He started working the closure on her bra, still walking her backwards, tugging it impatiently, proud of his ability to multitask. She smiled against his mouth and reached behind herself, batting his fingers out of his way and unsnapping it in a moment. It fell away, leaving her exposed to him, and he stopped in his tracks. Rose took a couple more steps back, biting her lip, until he reached out and caught her with one hand, pulling her back into his arms, relishing the feel of her breasts pressed against his chest, groaning at the sensation. 

“Rose,” he moaned, bringing his hands up to caress and mold the soft globes in his hands. 

“Bedroom, remember? Your room is only a couple of doors down.”

“ _Our_ room,” he corrected her.

“Our room,” she agreed. 

“I don’t know if I can wait, love.” 

“Bet I can get you there…” Rose took a couple of steps back and brought her hands around to the back of her waist, unzipping her dress the rest of the way as she walked backwards, slowly. The dress slipped off her hips to puddle in the floor and she stepped backwards out of it. His eyes shot down to the little triangle of red lace that was hiding her from him, and the Doctor was sure that he’d never been so jealous of an inanimate object in his life. 

“No fair, Doctor, me being the only one naked… Looks like that could use some room, too.” She darted her eyes down to the fall of his trousers and his massive erection contained therein. 

“You want me naked, Rose Tyler?” 

She nodded. 

“Well, like I told you before, I can’t help but give the lady what she wants…” He pulled up one foot, then the other, stripping off his socks, tossing them over his shoulder. His hands flew on the button and zip of his tuxedo trousers, even as he prowled towards her, and they fell away. He stepped out of them, leaving him in his pants, his focus entirely on Rose and the heat in her eyes. 

“Looks like we match now,” he commented, trying for casual. 

“Looks like.”

He darted a hand out for her with incredible speed, catching her wrist and pulling her towards him, kissing her wildly. His hands kneaded her bum and she ground her abdomen against his aching flesh, driving him mad. He bent a little, letting his hands roam down to her thighs, then tugged. “Jump up, love.”

She did, trusting him implicitly, and he didn’t abuse that trust. He caught her expertly, his wide hands covering the soft, lace-clad skin of her bum, and she wrapped her legs around his waist. This shift in her height gave him better access to her flesh and he bent his head to catch a nipple with his teeth. Rose cried out and he soothed it with his tongue. 

“Doctor,” she panted, clutching tightly at his shoulders, her back arched, moaning under the ministrations of his mouth. He grunted in question, unwilling to surrender his prize, and it took a second before she answered. “We’re only two doors away from the bedroom.”

He looked up then, over her shoulder, to see that she was right. The door to his bedroom ( _their bedroom_ ) was standing open, inviting them in, and he could just barely see the corner of the four-poster bed from where he stood. 

“Let’s go.”

He didn’t release Rose as he marched the last few steps towards the bedroom, but Rose didn’t seem to mind. She’d applied her mouth to the juncture of his neck and shoulder and was sucking and nibbling there. Her ministrations left him feeling almost wobbly, and steeled his resolve to get her to the bedroom as quickly as fucking possible. 

They finally made it and he kicked the door behind them closed. As soon as the door slammed, Rose brought her hands up to each side of his head and snogged him, frantically. He returned her passion and strode across the room, trusting centuries of muscle memory to get them to the bed safely. 

His knees hit the mattress just as Rose was doing this complicated, swirling thing around his tongue, and he didn’t release her right away. He simply stood there, gripping her bum tight in his hands, massaging it, enjoying the play of their mouths against each other. 

The rolling grind of her heat against his cock broke through the fog in his brain. He wanted _more_ of that. Better yet, more of that - but with no fabric between them. 

With an extreme force of will he broke the kiss, tossing her backwards onto the bed, enjoying the bounce of her breasts as she landed on her bum and leaned back on her hands. He hooked his thumbs into the waistband of his pants and started to pull them down, but Rose was on her knees before him in an instant, batting his hands away. 

“Let me,” she purred, putting her hands where his had been. She kissed and laved at his chest, working her way down even as she tugged his shorts off, revealing his straining cock. It bobbed before her, free of its confines, and the Doctor swallowed hard. He looked just like a human man, and just like a human man, he was anxious about what she thought. 

“S’that alright?”

She wrapped her hands around him, pumping slowly, and the Doctor thought wildly that he’d have to lie down soon because his legs may not support him if she kept that up. 

“S’glorious, Doctor,” she murmured, then brought her eyes up to his. “S’perfect.”

Then she opened her mouth and swirled her pink tongue, that tongue he loved so much, around the tip. The Doctor fairly shouted. 

Rose grinned, and he could see how pleased she was with herself. She did it again, and he made a strangled noise this time. Her smile didn’t fade when she opened her mouth to take him inside. He pitched forward, catching himself on her delicate, creamy shoulders, eyes closed and mouth open in a soundless cry. After a moment he gathered himself and stood back up while Rose licked the underside of his shaft, bottom to top, then wrapped one hand around his base and began to bob her head up and down, sucking so that her cheeks hollowed, her hand working what she couldn’t reach with her mouth. 

“Rose,” he croaked, and she favored him with a look, acknowledging him but not stopping. Her eyes were somehow dark and bright at the same time, and the sight of his cock disappearing into her hot, wet mouth was nearly enough to bring him off right then and there. He repeated her name, a plea for something he couldn’t articulate, and she smiled around him before bringing her free hand up to cup his balls. 

“Rose...you gotta...I’m gonna…”

She responded only by releasing the hand that cupped him, grabbing his hand and putting it on her head. The Doctor whimpered, then brought up the other hand, fisting them in the waves of her hair. He was trying desperately not to thrust, not to hurt her. 

She intensified her assault, sucking harder, pumping her fist faster, and he swore in Gallifreyan. 

“Rose… _oh fuck_...Rose...God, Rose...I’m close...You gotta stop…”

Rose did no such thing. She let go of him with her hand, clutched his hips and relaxed her throat, taking him as deep as she could and then - _oh Rassilon_ \- she _swallowed_ around him. 

He cried out inarticulately, her name falling from his mouth as he came in hot spurts down her throat. She took him all, guiding him through his orgasm with an increasingly slower rhythm, until she let him fall from her mouth into her hand, licking him clean. 

The Doctor panted above her, his breath coming in short gasps, shuddering from pleasure every time her tongue caressed his sensitive flesh. Rose sat back when he released his death grip on her hair, scooting backwards towards the middle of the bed, looking for all the world like the cat who got the canary. 

Fierce possessiveness welled within him. He’d never let this go, he’d never share her, she would be his. Forever. He’d figure out a way to keep her forever. He’d die himself if he didn’t.

The Doctor crawled towards her, stalking his prey. Rose leaned back, sliding herself towards the pillows, playfully retreating from him. 

“Ohh, Rose Tyler…” he grumbled as he approached her. “Now you’ve done it.”

“Done what?” she asked, innocent, teasing smile in place. 

“M’gonna make you come, Rose,” he promised, crawling overtop her and bracketing her thighs and shoulders between his knees and hands. “M’gonna make you scream. Gonna make you beg.” He caught her mouth and licked into her, plundering her, hardening again already. Her arms encircled his torso to pull him down. He went willingly, relishing the press of her breasts against his bare skin while she undulated seductively under him. 

When his mouth went to her jaw and then her neck, she gasped for air. “That so, Time Lord?”

“Oh, that’s so,” he lengthened his body, nipping at her earlobe before he growled. “Gonna make you scream. Gonna make you plead. Gonna make you _mine_.”

“Already am,” came the simple reply. 

His hearts soared, filled to overflowing with love for the woman before him. “Well then, I just need to make sure you don’t forget it.” 

Rose made a mewling, needy sound as his hand skated down her body, and the Doctor took great delight in the way her muscles jumped, responding to his touch. His fingers danced down her body until he reached her center, still covered by red lace, now completely sodden. He slipped his fingers under the barrier, seeking her curls. 

“Rassilon, Rose, you’re _soaked_.”

“S’what you do to me,” she breathed. 

“Well, that’s very messy,” he said, dipping one finger between her lips then another. “Suppose I’ll just have to clean you up.”

He didn’t miss the way her eyes widened. “Wha-?”

She didn’t get to finish. He sat up on his heels, looping his fingers into the sides of her panties and yanking them down, moved backwards to give her legs clearance. The panties slipped off her ankles, and suddenly she lay bare before him. 

The Doctor’s breath caught as he marveled at the sheer beauty of her, laid out in the embodiment of every one of his delicious fantasies. They could never do her justice. His eyes roved her, taking her in, even as she squirmed before him, reaching up to fondle and stroke her own breasts. 

“Is that what you like, Rose?” She nodded. “Have I been neglecting you?” He crawled up her body again. 

Rose gave a coquettish grin. “No, but I wouldn’t say no if you wanted to -oh!”

He’d descended on her right nipple, sucking as much of her breast into his mouth as he could. His hand sought out her other breast, squeezing it, tugging her nipple, mimicking the actions of his mouth on the other breast. 

Rose fairly purred, and that was lovely, but he wanted more. The hand that wasn’t occupied cupped her mons. She rolled her hips, a silent plea for more, and he could deny her nothing. He dipped one finger into her dripping core, circling the entrance a couple of times before he slid his finger into her. 

She cried out and bucked beneath his hand, and the Doctor switched breasts as he began pushing his finger into her rhythmically, adding another one, withdrawing then plunging again. She made raspy, gasping sounds that didn’t resemble language on their own, digging her nails into his shoulder, pleading. 

“You like that?”

“Fuck, Doctor. God… _fuck_.”

“That good, eh?” he smirked against her breast. “What about if I do this?” His thumb sought out her clit and rubbed it, making her shout his name. 

“Oh, so you like _that_?” He was pleased by the little moan she gave in response. “How about _this_?”

He curled his fingers inside her and her hips shot off the mattress. He grinned at her reaction and began trailing his lips and tongue down her torso, nipping her every now and then until he reached her navel. From there, he licked a long stripe to where his fingers were buried inside her, working her just enough to drive her mad but not enough to make her come. He had other plans for that. 

“No, please,” she begged. “Need you, not your mouth, please, Doctor. _Please_.”

“Shhh, love, you’ll have me,” he soothed her, preparing for what he wanted by laying his forearm across her hips to hold her down. Rose whimpered. “Told you it was a mess down here. Gotta clean it up.”

“Please. Want you!”

He removed his thumb, curling his tongue around her clit and oh, the sound she made when he did was just _fantastic_. He licked and sucked, trailing his tongue down to his questing fingers and lapping up the juices that had pooled there. She tasted of honey, musk, heaven, and _Rose_ , and the Doctor couldn’t get enough of her. He wanted more of that taste, that smell. He removed his fingers, licking them clean before he dove back into her, driving his tongue in as far as it would go.

“Fuck! Doctor! _Yes_! Fuck! _Please_!”

He didn’t stop, just kept devouring her, loving the way her thighs alternately tightened around his head and splayed wide, opening her like a feast before him. 

And he did feast upon her while using his finger to tap a little syncopated rhythm on her clit before he withdrew his tongue and switched them, driving his fingers into her while she keened above him. His erection was throbbing and he dug his hips into the duvet, seeking any friction, willing himself to wait. He just had to wait. He’d be buried in her soft, clenching heat soon enough. 

His fingers sped up and he raised his head. “That good?”

Rose was gripping his ears, bringing herself to his mouth with little cries that stroked his ego. Again, he didn’t deny her what she so desperately wanted, he never could. Instead, he ran his tongue along the join, then hardened it to a point, marking her as his with firm little strokes. 

The Doctor was halfway through his name - his real name - when she flew apart, screaming her pleasure, his name, and the name of her favorite deity, interspersed with delicious filth. He lapped at her, licking her clean of all her dripping juices, working her down as she twitched and panted. When he was sure that he’d wrung every little drop from her, he surged to his knees and stroked himself lazily with the hand that still held the moisture from her clenching warmth. 

She lay gasping and breathless beneath him. He came down onto his hands, hovering above her, looking into her eyes. 

“You want this?”

“More than anything. I love you.”

“Oh, precious girl, I love you, too.”

He kissed her then, let her taste herself on him while he sought out her tongue, chasing it, wrestling with it, both of them seeking to assert dominance. Rose gave as good as she got and he guided himself between her slick folds, nudging at her entrance. She gripped his shoulders and brought her hips up just as he was thrusting forward, and he hilted into her much harder than he’d anticipated. 

The Doctor struggled for breath, holding perfectly still to let her adjust, his mouth open wide and panting above hers, breathing in the air from her lungs. Rose wasn’t content with him being perfectly still; she rolled her hips, impatient. He groaned at the bit of friction, lowering his head to her shoulder. The feeling was brilliant; smooth, velvety heat encased him where they were joined, and he didn’t think he’d ever felt so content in all of his lives. She was giving herself to him, she loved him.

“Rose…” he whispered. “My Rose.”

“Yes. I’m all yours.”

Feeling more sure that he wouldn’t pop off like an adolescent of ninety instead of a fully-grown Time Lord of nine hundred, he withdrew from her and slid back in, then did it again. Rose clutched at him, digging her short nails into his shoulder blades, and he grinned at her. 

“Trying to mark me as yours, love?”

She released him instantly, an apologetic look on her face. “I’m sorry.”

He brought his mouth down to hers, kissing her languidly to match the push and pull of his hips against hers. 

“Don’t be sorry, precious girl. I’m yours. Feel free to mark me as much as you like.” He gave her a wolfish grin. “Especially when I’m doing _this_.”

He punctuated the last word with a harder thrust, causing Rose to clench around him. His grin dissolved, his focus solely on the fantastic feeling of her wrapped around him, his cock buried in her heat, sliding like oil over silk. 

“More,” Rose begged in his ear, even as she nibbled his earlobe. “More, Doctor.”

“Your wish is my command.”

He sped up: not as much as she wanted, but enough to intensify the sensations that both of them were feeling. She writhed beneath him, apparently as affected as he was. Her eyes were closed in ecstasy and she bit her lip. 

The Doctor decided that if anyone was going to bite that lip, it would be him. He rescued it from her teeth and sucked it between his own lips, nibbling it. Rose wrapped her legs around his waist and locked her ankles over his bum, using them for leverage to bring herself up to meet his thrusts. 

“Rose, oh my Rose.” He peppered kisses all over her face and neck, trying to concentrate on her pleasure and not the throbbing excitement in his cock. 

“Doctor, please…”

“Please what, love?”

“Harder...faster... _please_ …”

If she wanted harder and faster, he’d give it to her. Anything and everything she wanted, it was all hers. All she asked for, all he could give her, all of it, hers. 

He increased the pace of his thrusts, surging into her harder, just as she’d asked. She rewarded him with a sound that he immediately set about trying to hear again. 

“Good...so good…” she panted beneath him. “Want more…”

“You have all of me,” he breathed against her neck. “All of me. All yours.”

“ _Faster_ , Doctor. Please - _fuck_ \- faster. Harder.”

His control was as tight and thin as a bowstring, and she was fraying it. He wanted this to last for hours, wanted to have her insensible before he sent her over the edge again...then again...and again…

“I can’t, Rose. It’ll be over too soon.”

She clawed at his shoulders again. “We have forever now, yeah? Please...take me harder...make me yours.”

He felt the bowstring snap with an almost audible sound. His pumping into her became pounding, and she cried out below him. “Yes! Yes! Please! _Fuck me harder_!”

The Doctor would have done anything she asked, had he been able to think of anything beyond the way it felt to slam his cock into her over and over again. Reaching down, he looped one arm under her knee and pulled it up, changing his angle of penetration and eliciting a squeal from her. 

“Right there! Oh...right _there_! I’m gonna...I’m close…”

He brought his hand between them and rubbed frantic, messy circles over her clit. “Come, Rose,” he gasped. “Come for me, only for me. Come, love!”

She obeyed, arching her back and crying out his name. She clenched and fluttered around him and he drove into her impossibly harder, chasing his own release. 

Surging to his knees, he put one hand on the headboard for leverage and slammed his cock into her over and over, entranced by watching it disappear inside her only to come back out shining with her juices.

“Rose,” he grunted, “Rose, all mine, _my_ Rose, you’re so hot, so fucking _tight_ , all mine, _my Rose_.”

She rolled her head from side to side beneath him, wildly bucking her hips into him, and he felt the hot ball of pressure at the base of his spine that indicated his orgasm was close. So close. 

“I’m close, love. Gonna come for you. Gonna come _in_ you.”

“Please,” she whimpered. “I’m yours, come for me.”

It was well-established that he’d do anything to please her, and he didn’t fail this time. Pleasure was sucked from the very marrow of his bones as he thrust into her three more times and fell over the precipice into orgasm, brilliant fireworks exploding behind his eyes, shaming the ones they’d seen earlier.


	6. Shimmer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading my story! I hope you liked it. <3

The air around them cooled the light sheen of sweat that coated both of their bodies. Rose had shivered once, so the Doctor had reached down to pull the duvet over both of them before taking her back into his arms, lying belly-to-belly with her. She shimmered before him, resplendent in the afterglow of their lovemaking, her eyes closed and a light smile gracing her features. He couldn’t help but kiss her: little feather-light busses all over her face and the occasional snog when he felt he’d die if he didn’t taste her mouth again. 

Rose’s eyes fluttered open to look at him. “Hello.”

He grinned, so pleased with himself, pleased with her. “Hello, yourself.”

She smiled back at him, then closed her eyes, snuggling into his broad chest. “That was wonderful, Doctor.”

“Was pretty fantastic, wasn’t it?”

“Hmm,” she purred, curling into him. “Do you feel better now?”

He’d honestly forgotten what had him upset in the first place until she mentioned it. 

“A bit,” he allowed.

She reared back, looking him in the eye. “Just a bit?”

“Pretty boys are still going to flirt with you, Rose, and I know you. You’ll let them.”

“Sure I will. Let them flirt. I’ll be going home with you, no matter where we are.”

“Home,” he echoed.

She gave him an indulgent smile. “Yes, home. Home to our TARDIS. Home to our bed.”

“So it really is ours, then?”

Rose nodded. “Unless you just said it in the moment and want to take it back. I’ll survive if you do, but I would like to share with you.”

He kissed the tip of her nose impetuously. “Oh, Rose Tyler, I want to share everything with you.”

“Good.” She nuzzled back into his chest. 

“How long are you gonna stay with me?”

“As long as I can,” she told him. “Forever.”

“Forever is a really long time, Rose.”

“I know. And I know that my forever doesn’t match yours. But I want you to have it. I’d stay for your forever if I could, if you wanted me to.”

“Of course I want you to,” he gathered her closer. “Never want to let you go, me. It’ll kill me to do it.”

Rose sighed and settled deeper into his arms. He stroked her back absently while he considered what she’d just said. There were ways...ways to prolong life...but that was something he’d have to research then talk to her about. What they had was too precious, too fragile in its embryonic stage to discuss something quite that heavy. It could keep. 

“I meant it, you know.”

“Hmm?” he asked.

“I’m yours, Doctor. You don’t have to share me. M’all yours. You don’t have to worry about Jack or anyone else. I’ll always come home to you. I’ll always be yours. I love you.”

“I love you too, Rose Tyler. Always.”

“Forever,” she murmured. 

“Forever,” he smiled. 

~*~O~*~

Jack opened the door to the TARDIS cautiously, poking just his head inside before he pushed the door wide enough for him to step through. Nobody was in the console room, and he wondered for just a moment where they’d gone. 

Then he saw the clothes scattered everywhere, and knew _exactly_ where they were.

Shoes lay on the floor near the console, along with the Doctor’s tuxedo shirt. His jacket lay half on and half off the jump seat, and the untied bow tie rested on the console, draped over a lever. 

Jack chuckled to himself and started towards his room, finding a pair of socks at the entrance to the corridor and trousers just beyond it. Rose’s dress lay in a puddle a few steps ahead. He tried not to pay attention to the red lace bra that dangled from a strut: the Doctor would kill him if he had even a stray thought about what Rose may or may not look like in (or out of) that particular bit of apparel. 

He smirked. “Told ya, Rosie,” he crowed to himself as he stepped over the dress and made his way to his room.


End file.
